IMPRESSMENT.
Europe, at the period which we have now reached, was engaged in a
general war. This had begun with the French Revolution, when France bade
defiance to the rest of the world; and, kept alive by the aggressive
policy and military ambition of Napoleon, it continued, with occasional
interruptions, until the power of the French Emperor was overthrown at
Waterloo. During all this time England was the most persistent and
successful enemy of the French,--fighting them sometimes alone,
sometimes in coalition with the great States of the Continent, but
always fighting. It was on the sea that the English were most
successful. Here the French and the Spaniards, brave as they were,
seemed to be no match for the islanders; and the splendid victories of
Lord Howe off Ushant, of Sir John Jervis at Cape St. Vincent, and last
and greatest of all, of Nelson at the Nile and at Trafalgar, won for the
English Navy an imperishable renown, and destroyed the naval power of
France and Spain.
The wonderful battles between the French and English navies were fought
with great fleets, numbering sometimes thirty or forty
ships-of-the-line, carrying each from sixty to one hundred and twenty
guns, and the largest of them as many as one thousand men. To keep these
fleets manned with sailors was no easy task. After all who would
volunteer were gathered in, there still remained a great dearth of men;
for it was a hard life that the sailors led on board the ships-of-war,
especially if, as often happened, the captain, or the second in command,
was a harsh and tyrannical officer. How bitterly the men hated the
service was shown by the mutinies at Spithead and the Nore. So it became
necessary to resort to compulsion to recruit the crews.
If the Government had established a draft or conscription to obtain its
seamen, enrolling all the population, or all the seafaring part of it,
and drawing names by lot, as sometimes must be done even in free
countries, things would not have been so bad. Instead of that it got
them by a method which was called "impressment." A press-gang composed
of a party of armed sailors under a lieutenant or a warrant officer was
sent ashore to seize any stray men it could find, and run them in for
His Majesty's service. In all the seaport towns were crimps and runners,
rascally fellows who knew the town and the inhabitants, and who
frequented all the sailors' lodging-houses; and these were employed to
put the press-gangs on the track of likely men who could be forced into
the service. In such towns, after dark, when these prowlers scoured the
streets, it was hardly safe for any one to go out alone; for if he were
caught and made remonstrance, a gag and a pair of handcuffs were ready
to stay both voice and arm. Even when a sailor had shipped for his
voyage in a merchantman and had got out to sea, he was not safe from
capture. For the merchantman falling in with a ship-of-war was obliged
to heave to, when a lieutenant came on board and took such men as suited
his fancy.
But with all this the English fleet was still short of men. So the
officers or the Government, or both together, hit upon a new device. In
time of war the naval ships of either party have the right to stop and
search all merchant-vessels on the high seas, to see if they are enemies
or neutrals, and whether they are pursuing any illegal trade; and the
foreigners must submit, because if their own country were at war its
naval ships would do the same. As England was all this time at war, it
came about that any American merchantman falling in with English
cruisers must undergo a search. If the merchant-ship had any
natural-born Englishmen in her crew, although they might have emigrated
long before, and have become citizens of the American Republic, the
English Government held that they were still subjects, and that they
might be taken out if they were needed for the service of the King. This
was an outrage, because no such right of taking persons out of neutral
ships exists. But this was not the worst. As the two nations were of the
same blood and spoke the same language, their sailors could not easily
be told apart; and thus Americans were sometimes taken on the pretence
that they had formerly been English. The cruiser's officer when he
mustered the crew was never very particular about the selection if he
wanted the men, as he was always sure to do. Often, indeed, he did not
care much whether they were Americans or not, and having a force behind
him, he could not be gainsaid or resisted.
The Government of the United States protested against this practice, but
as it did not believe much in naval armaments, and never followed up its
protests by making a show of force, little heed was paid to them; while
England, being in such great necessity, and not over-scrupulous as to
the means of relieving it, continued the practice. The American
Government then granted to its sailor-citizens passports or certificates
of nationality, which were called "protections," but which nevertheless
did not always protect. At any rate a man who had not taken out the
"protection"--and sailors, as everybody knows, are careless in such
matters--was sure to be impressed, whatever evidence he might give of
birth or nationality. So the men were seized, and where they could they
made complaint, though it often happened that they did not have the
chance; and when the complaints reached home, the State Department kept
on filing them, and entering its futile protests and arguments and
counter-arguments. But still, as might be expected from such a course,
the practice of impressment never ceased, until finally there were
several thousand native-born Americans serving under constraint in the
Royal Navy.
On one or two occasions the English had even gone so far as to take
seamen out of our ships-of-war, which is perhaps as gross an affront as
one nation can offer to another. This was done by Commodore Loring, who
commanded a powerful squadron off Havana in 1798, and who removed five
men from the sloop-of-war "Baltimore," of twenty guns. As the English
force was composed of the "Queen," of ninety-eight guns, and several
frigates, they could have sunk the "Baltimore" with a single broadside.
So the American ship made no resistance. Gross as it was, this injury
did not bring on a war or even reprisals; although reprisals might have
been used with good effect, as they were about the same time against
France.
Again in 1807, when the "Chesapeake" was starting from Hampton Roads for
a cruise in the Mediterranean, she was followed out to sea by the
British frigate "Leopard," which sent an officer on board to demand that
some of the "Chesapeake's" men, who were supposed to be deserters from
the English navy, should be given up; and when the demand was very
properly refused, she attacked the "Chesapeake," in sight of our own
coast, and in time of peace,--discharging broadside after broadside at
the vessel of a friendly State. The "Chesapeake," which had gone to sea
unprepared to fight, through hurry in preparation, and also it must be
said through negligence on the part of certain of her officers, could
not fire a shot in reply, the powder-horns and matches for priming and
setting off the guns not being ready, and the men not having been called
to quarters at the proper time. So she made a very poor showing, even
allowing, as was the case, that her assailant was superior in force;
only one gun being fired in reply, which was touched off by a live coal
which Allen, one of the younger lieutenants, carried in his hand from
the galley, to save the honor of the flag. After the "Chesapeake"
surrendered, four men were taken from her to the "Leopard" and she
returned to port. This galling insult, which makes one blush to hear of
even after so great a lapse of time, was only atoned for four years
after it was given. And yet the country forbore to go to war, or even to
make such preparations that if war came the navy might be ready for it.
One would think that the Government must have grown very tired of making
complaints, for during all these years its foreign correspondence was
chiefly made up of protests and requests for redress. To all these
evasive answers were given, or hopes held out which never were
fulfilled. Besides the outrage of impressment, there were many grievous
wrongs inflicted on American commerce through the Orders in Council
which the British issued; and France, too, through Napoleon's Berlin and
Milan decrees, did us serious injury. The French decrees were finally
revoked, as were also at the last moment the Orders in Council; but
England never would give up the right she claimed to take out of
American vessels seamen that were supposed to be English.
At last matters reached such a point that the nation refused to submit
longer to these repeated insults. The British frigate "Guerrière,"
cruising off New York, had impressed a seaman from an American coaster
almost in sight of Sandy Hook. Commodore Rodgers, in the frigate
"President," was now employed in patrolling the coast, and he was
resolved, if he should meet the "Guerrière," to demand the man's
surrender. One evening he fell in with a British cruiser, the
sloop-of-war "Little Belt," which in the dark he mistook for a frigate.
His ship was cleared for action, the crew were at their quarters, and
the guns were loaded and double-shotted; for the "President" was not
going to be caught unprepared, as the "Chesapeake" had been four years
before. Ranging up to her, Rodgers hailed the "Little Belt," but in
reply his hail was only repeated; and as he hailed the second time, the
sloop fired a shot at him. The "President" returned the fire before
Rodgers could give an order, for the crew were only waiting for the
chance; and no wonder, considering what American seamen had suffered
from English ships-of-war. The firing continued on both sides, until at
last the "Little Belt" was silenced. In the morning the commodore sent
his boat to her with offers of assistance; but these were refused, and
the "Little Belt" proceeded on her way to Halifax, where she arrived
almost a wreck.
This incident, though not important in itself, added fresh fuel to the
fire that was already kindled. There was now a strong party of younger
men in Congress, who were resolved that the United States should no
longer submit tamely to foreign aggression. These at last succeeded in
making themselves heard, and they carried Congress with them. Unhappily
but little had been done in all these years of encroachment to prepare
the navy, the nation's principal arm of defence, to resist an enemy; and
although the dominant party was now active and alert about rousing a war
spirit, they seemed to be exceedingly dull of comprehension about the
necessity of preparations for defence. Therefore, except for the few
noble frigates which Washington's foresight had provided, and the fine
corps of naval officers whom Jefferson had selected and Preble had
trained, we were as ill-prepared for war as it was possible to be.
Nevertheless, the war party, rightly conceiving that the country could
not endure forever the alternate bullying and subterfuge of foreign
States, were determined to make an armed resistance; and on the 18th of
June, 1812, war was declared against Great Britain.